A remarkable performance by Gerard Depardieu as a tough Paris policeman who falls in love with thief and pathological liar Sophie Marceau is at the core of this excellent policier and won him the Best Actor Award at the 1985 Venice Fim Festival. The director, Maurice Pialat, used improvisation to great effect and creates a compelling sense of atmosphere and milieu with a combination of well-created drama and strong elements of cinema-verité. If there is any moral to the relentless and downbeat story, it is that cops and criminals are the opposite sides of the same coin and feed parasitically off each other. Marceau holds her own well against Depardieu's formidable acting and Richard Anconina sketches in a fascinating portrait of a shady young lawyer.


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